The trio received their schedule from Joshua, changed into clothes more appropriate for their training that was already in the only wardrobe of the room. It consisted of a bland and undyed woolen tunic with long sleeves and leather trousers. It was enough protection from the cold if you were to spend some time training, but if a person went outside with it, they would freeze to death.
They soon made their way to the grounds where their physical exercise would take place. This particular barracks had more than a dozen courts for the specialized training some soldiers had to do every day. Joshua briefly mentioned how one of them was permanently reserved for their use only.
He complemented this piece of trivia by saying that this was not a normal thing. It so happens that his superiors got orders to give the three more attention, as they had greater potential than the last batches. However, he was sure to make it clear that nobles would have better gear, instructors and training areas, and that in no hypothesis they should consider themselves as worthy or important as the ones with better origins.
{It feels like he is trying hard to hammer in our heads the notion that nobles are superior to commoners. Judging by Anna and Gregory's expressions, they will soon start falling for this indoctrination.}
Upon arriving, they noticed a sleepy soldier as he was finishing converting one of the training courts for their use. He finished putting the last obstacle in place, finally noticing the arrival of the trio.
There was a rack by the side with weapons together with dummies and targets to be used in the combat training that would follow.
"Welcome kids, my name is Edward Farsteel. I will be your instructor for physical and combat training every other day. The other days your training will be overseen by my sister, Eleanor Farsteel. Although we are the instructors, don't expect us to be here every day. We will always oversight your training when we make changes to the routine to see how you will adapt. The rest of the time, a soldier will be here to make sure you stick to the plans we made and don't slack off."
The three nodded.
"Good! Joshua, you can go take care of your things, I got this."
"As you wish my lord." Joshua bowed and left.
Riwall was surprised, according to what Joshua said the day before, ordinary soldiers would train them, and this one was clearly not a simple soldier.
"As you may have noticed, I am a noble from the Farsteel house. The Lord Marsastor is putting a lot of faith in your future, and if not for the other nobles' fierce opposition, you would all be training with the elite by now."
{Ha, so it's like that! He must be from one of the families that are more pragmatic when it comes to who deserves to be trained with the best resources.}
"You see, the Farsteels are one of the youngest noble bloodlines, we were raised to nobility three decades ago, and we are from a commoner origin, so, naturally, we have no contempt for commoners like most of the other bloodlines."
Edward sighed after he noticed how only one of the kids was understanding the implications of what he was saying.
"Huh, nevermind. Let's get to the training."
Edward was no amateur when it came to training, and he had no qualms about pushing kids to their bodies' limits. By the end of the physical exercises, he had made notes about each of the kids and designed a routine for each of them. It was clear that he was focusing on building their stamina.
As soon as he noticed that Riwall was breezing through his course, he made changes that made Riwall almost faint of tiredness by the end. Friday was constantly guiding his body recovery to prepare for the upcoming combat training. Anna, and especially Gregory, were not as lucky.
Edward gave them some water and a bland ration composed of beef jerky and a loaf of stale bread and after about one hour of resting, he began their combat training.
Riwall asked for Friday to hold off her movement correction function. Not because he wanted to learn it entirely by himself, but because he was afraid Edward would notice his skills and ramp up his training.
Close to the end of the edge weapons training, Riwall got rewarded with his first combat skill:
---CONGRATULATIONS!---
--New Skill Branch Unlocked--
-Melee Combat - Level 1-
--New Skill Unlocked--
The changes to his movements were so minimal that only Friday could precisely point them.
{It feels like I have understood some of the things I was doing wrong. Honestly, I can't precisely say what I am doing better, but I have this feeling that moving like this is better than the way I was moving before.}
[Your movements are slightly closer to what would be ideal, the change is barely noticeable. It is hard to define what this skill advancement really did to us. I can't state precisely if you had a small epiphany and corrected your movements, or if the system recognized your efforts and rewarded you with the knowledge to do better.]
{Maybe its a bit of both? You said before that the system is part of nature here, the mental attributes even had some influence in my psyche. If not for my otherworldly soul, we would have never noticed the limitations imposed by it.}
[I want to make a test, please authorize me to resume correcting your movements.]
{What if Edward notices?}
[I have been monitoring him since we first laid our eyes on him. He did not make a single microexpression of disgust or anger when any of you made any mistake. And when he noticed you got better, he even smiled proudly. It's a bet, but I think we should try getting the Farsteels backing, or at least get on their good side, and he is making clear that seeing you guys improving makes him happy.]
{Absolutely no Friday, there are many factors you are not taking into account. He may be a good person, but what if this is the influence of some item or skill? What if he is kind but extremely loyal to the Lord and decides to spill the beans of how I can improve my skills overnight? I won't take the chance.}
Riwall found Friday shallow analysis to be worrying. It did not make sense for her to jump to conclusions in this scenario. They lacked too much information to make any critical decisions now. And besides, there was no rush to get high skill levels or to test her theory. Suddenly a bulb lighted in his mind.
{Was this a test to gauge my impulsiveness?}
He felt like something inside of him felt happy and proud. Was his connection to his AI progressing further to the point he could feel her emotions?
[Yes. If you had accepted without giving it proper thought, I would have explained to you your oversights. When we are at ease and have time, never blindly trust any suggestion I make. I am far from foolproof. I will make mistakes and oversights that you will be able to notice quickly. But when we are in a fight or flight situation, trust me, my reflexes and spatial awareness are much higher than any humans'.]
{That is some food for thought. I will meditate about it later, as soon as we get spar partners, we have to get into training ourselves to react during combat appropriately.}
[Agreed]
-------------------------
Hours stretched by and they got into the next step of their schedule.
During the archery training, Riwall unlocked yet another combat skill:
---CONGRATULATIONS!---
--New Skill Branch Unlocked--
-Ranged Physical Combat - Level 1-
--New Skill Unlocked--
Again, Riwall could not pinpoint which came first, his mini epiphany that allowed him to get slightly better, or the skill level.
He discussed it with Friday, and they opted to do a small test that hopefully would not make Edward notice anything suspicious.
Friday would slowly but steadily correct his movements and improve his accuracy. It took him almost two hours to get one level of
{Is it a system based on results, effort or both? Ready Friday?}
[Ready]
-------------------------
Edward noticed how Riwall stopped firing his bow and gave the target a serious look. The boy then corrected his posture, which was amateurishly wrong before. It was still far from that of apprentice archers, but an improvement nonetheless.
His first arrow flew faster and more accurately, but still far from the bullseye.
The next ones got closer and closer to the target, by the fifth arrow, the boy stopped and sat on the ground to meditate. Edward noticed how he spaced out for a second after the last shoot, and he quickly recognized the signs of the epiphany that came with a skill level up. This feat was a sign of the boy being a prodigy of archery, but as he was young, it could be nothing but a knack for archery that would not develop further in the future.
-------------------------
---CONGRATULATIONS!---
--Skill Levell Up--
{That really narrowed down the search for the truth. It took what? 10 seconds to get to level2?}
[7 seconds and 17 milliseconds to be more precise. Now we know that the results matter more than the effort by a large margin. I am extrapolating a few formulas that may describe how the skill gain is calculated, but I don't think it will be that easy. It may be that this result centered approach only works on lower skill levels.]
{Makes sense, we still need so much more information about this System thing. There have to be books and research papers about it somewhere. We need to ask Hector about it. Maybe we can try fishing Edward for information, what do you think?}
[Let's wait a few more days before doing so, we still know nothing about this guy.]
Riwall shrugged and kept on his training. Soon, it was time for Anna and Gregory to excuse themselves for their reading and writing classes.
Edward gave Riwall a few minutes to rest before moving on to blunt and pole weapons training.
"Tell me Riwall, how did it feel to reach level 2 in
{Fuck!} Riwall was surprised by Edward's sudden comment, but luckily Friday got a hold of his facial muscles before he answered with his face.
"I don't know what you mean, Mr. Farsteel." Riwall confused expression and calm tone almost fooled Edward, but he had a high
"Are you sure boy? It would be unwise to lie to your combat master."
---CONGRATULATIONS!---
--New Skill Branch Unlocked--
-Negotiation - Level 1-
--New Skill Unlocked--
--Skill Levelled Up--
{Holy crap, We have been spinning small lies to Erika since I learned how to talk, and never got a skill for that.}
[It may be related to the why and how we lied to her, which was a no-risk scenario against a subject that was not seriously scrutinizing our behavior. While now we did it to protect information that we judge to be very important against someone who was fishing for information.]
{What do we do? Risk lying again, or tell the truth?}
[He already know we raised
"Ok, my
"Hahaha! I knew it! You see, I have been training youngsters for the last ten years, they all get the same blank look whenever they level up a skill and get an epiphany. And as it happened twice, I deduced you must have reached level 2."
"Wait, are you saying everyone experiences the same thing?"
"Of course they do! How else do you think a should a skill level up should feel? In the future, I will teach you three a spell for accessing a panel with your information for keeping track of your progress. It is like having a Muller's Tablet inside your head." Edward promised with a smile. He loved to see the face kids made when learning about the |Panel| spell.
{Did you know about it Friday?}
[How could I know? No one ever said anything about it.]
"Then what's the use of the Muller's Tablet if everyone could just use this spell you mentioned?" Riwall still had limited knowledge about the tablet and magic.
"I am truly surprised by how little you know. Before Muller created his tablet, the System did not show itself, everyone felt something strange when they got a skill level, but they could never translate their progress into numbers. Once a mage knows what he wants, getting it is just a matter of time and mana, the spell |Panel| was created not much long after Muller spread his creation schematics."
{Did Erika did not know about this when she told us about the tablet?}
[Or she oversimplified the story because she was telling it to a toddler and thought he wanted to get to the part where the hero killed the villain?]
Edward continued.
"The Muller's Tablet was a true revolution for two reasons. First, he proved that there was a higher force of nature guiding us, people referred to it as the System, and the name stuck. According to books from that period, it was truly liberating for the masses of that time to finally understand what was that they felt when they leveled up or raised their skills level. Second, we can now safely ID people, few skills can fool a Muller's Tablet, and even fewer can fool a higher quality one. As soon as a child forms a mana core and interact with a tablet, they get to keep track of their progress, and the Lord gets to know more about his subordinates."
{And the only reason I did not know about it is that you have always provided the means for me to keep track of my information even without the tablet.}
[I am awesome like that.]